What is the 19th Amendment?

On August 18, 1920, the 19th Amendment was added to the United States Constitution. So what is the 19th Amendment? It says:

The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex.

Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

Until this was added to the Constitution, women could only vote in fifteen of the forty-eight states. But they couldn’t vote nationwide. The 19th Amendment changed all that.

Nowadays, the idea of stopping women from voting clearly seems unjust. So it’s hard to believe that it still hasn’t been a century since the 19th Amendment was ratified. When the amendment passed, women voting was still a highly contested issue. Tennessee was the final of the 36 states to ratify the amendment. And even though it passed there, the vote was almost evenly split, with 50 of the 99 members of the state’s House of Representatives voting in favor. That means 49 members still believed women shouldn’t be allowed to vote. After it was ratified, people still argued against the amendment. A man in Maryland named Oscar Leser tried to stop two women in Baltimore from voting, but the court upheld their rights.

Women’s suffrage is one of the most memorable battles (and victories) in the history of women’s rights, but it’s not the end of the story. Women have continued to fight ever since, and even now there are still inequalities. On average, women make less than 78 cents for every dollar a man makes. Discrimination and even violence against women is still horrifyingly commonplace. One day, full equality may be achieved, but unfortunately, we aren’t there yet.

Listen to our Women’s Rights song to learn more about the history of the equal rights movement.